Abstract: In Morrison's A Mercy, the heroine Florens's twisty growth has always been the focus of attention. Yet the published literature has mainly focused on the internal elements that lead to the heroine's growth predicaments and has paid less attention to the external social and cultural elements that influence and restrict her thoughts and behaviors. This paper regards that the west traditional femininity as an ethical identity plays a significant role in Florens's loss of selfhood and her growth predicament, while the process of the heroine's disillusion with the misleading myth and reconstruction of her selfhood and subjectivity makes up the key steps for her to get out of her predicaments, and at the same time forms the novel's principal narrative structure. With the combination of a realistic representation of the process by the heroine's internal monologue and a metaphoric and ironic representation of the process by the charged image of “shoes”, the novel gives the west traditional femininity an incisive introspection.

Key words: Morrison, A Mercy, femininity, Ethical Literary Criticism, ethical identity